Monday, November 28, 2005

So I understand that I don’t understand God. That’s why I am doing all this reading. Ok, this is taking me nowhere. I don’t want proof, I want experience. Let’s try the next site, http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/06608a.htm. Let’s click the Nature and Attributes of God link. The summary reads “In this article, we proceed by deductive analysis to examine the nature and attributes of God to the extent required by our limited philosophical scope. We will treat accordingly of the infinity, unity, and simplicity of God, adding some remarks on Divine personality.” The material is pretty good.

When we say that God is infinite, we mean that He is unlimited in every kind of perfection or that every conceivable perfection belongs to Him in the highest conceivable way. In a different sense we sometimes speak, for instance, of infinite time or space, meaning thereby time of such indefinite duration or space of such indefinite extension that we cannot assign any fixed limit to one or the other. Care should be taken not to confound these two essentially different meanings of the term. Time and space, being made up of parts in duration or extension, are essentially finite by comparison with God's infinity. Now we assert that God is infinitely perfect in the sense explained, and that His infinity is deducible from His self-existence. For a self-existent being, if limited at all, could be limited only by itself; to be limited by another would imply causal dependence on that other, which the very notion of self-existence excludes. But the self-existing cannot be conceived as limiting itself, in the sense of curtailing its perfection of being, without ceasing to be self-existing. Whatever it is, it is necessarily; its own essence is the sole reason or explanation of its existence, so that its manner of existence must be as unchangeable as its essence, and to suggest the possibility of an increase or diminution of perfection would be to suggest the absurdity of a changeable essence. It only remains, then, to say that whatever perfection is compatible with its essence is actually realized in a self-existing being; but as there is no conceivable perfection as such -- that is, no expression of positive being as such -- that is not compatible with the essence of the self-existent, it follows that the self-existent must be infinite in all perfection. For self-existence itself is absolute positive being and positive being cannot contradict, and cannot therefore limit, positive being.

This general, and admittedly very abstract, conclusion, as well as the reasoning which supports it, will be rendered more intelligible by a brief specific illustration of what it involves.

Good. I need something a little more intelligible. Now they shine some light on what they mean:

(i) When, in speaking of the Infinite, we attribute all conceivable perfections to Him, we must not forget that the predicates we employ to describe perfections derive their meaning and connotation in the first instance from their application to finite beings; and on reflection it is seen that we must distinguish between different kinds of perfections, and that we cannot without palpable contradiction attribute all the perfections of creatures in the same way to God. Some perfections are such that even in the abstract, they necessarily imply or connote finiteness of being or imperfection; while some others do not of themselves necessarily connote imperfection.

Oh. Ok. Well then, on to the next site. Oh, oh, wait. There is a section on The Blessed Trinity, I have always sort of wondered how that works. I'll save that part for tomorrow's post.

Monday, November 21, 2005

Do not harm the land or the sea or the trees until we put a seal on the foreheads of the servants of our God." 4Then I heard the number of those who were sealed: 144,000 from all the tribes of Israel.5From the tribe of Judah 12,000 were sealed, from the tribe of Reuben 12,000, from the tribe of Gad 12,000,6from the tribe of Asher 12,000, from the tribe of Naphtali 12,000, from the tribe of Manasseh 12,000,7from the tribe of Simeon 12,000, from the tribe of Levi 12,000, from the tribe of Issachar 12,000,8from the tribe of Zebulun 12,000, from the tribe of Joseph 12,000, from the tribe of Benjamin 12,000.

Thursday, November 17, 2005

I knew two families with kids who were Christian. I just figured it was their flavor of insanity and didn’t think much of it. I guess I figured it was harmless. The only two times it ever entered my life were when my dad asked one of the neighbor kids if Jesus or Superman was stronger and when my other Christian friend and I read his Christian comic books up in his room.In hindsight, those were both pretty funny experiences.Riding home in the backseat of our Oldsmobile station wagon- the great big kind from the late sixties/ early seventies- and seven year old Billy was talking about Jesus.My dad asked him who was stronger, Jesus or Superman. Billy immediately answered “Jesus”.My dad responded, “but Superman can fly”.That stumped Billy. I wonder if he ever thought about that question again.

The other time, I was staying the night at my other Christian friend’s house, we read his Christian comics while he told me about god. The comics had the evil Satanists imbued with supernatural powers fueled by their blood sacrifices and so on pitted against the weak and lowly Christians who only had one power and it seemed like a pretty pathetic power to me.They could call on Jesus when they were captured by the powerful Satanists and the Satanists would die. The Satanist had super strength from their god.The Christians had squat. When I suggested to my friend that the Satanists seemed like they had the better deal, he replied, “but the Christians can kill the Satanists!” So the lesson I took away from that was avoiding Christians if you happen to be a Satanist. They want to kill you.

Enough clowning around. I have a lot of ground to cover if I want to find out about god. It might take me a while and I have some background to catch up on.

You see, I was raised without official religion. I remember as a young child having to fill in the name of my church in school documents. (In those days that was important information for the school, like my credit score is now). My mom told me the name of the church we went to, but it was a lie. We’d never been to church. I take that back. According to my parents, I was taken to church once when I was two. I screamed the whole time in nursery school or wherever they take babies who might scream, and the nice lady who probably also ran the potlucks and other church functions asked my parents not to bring me back.And because that was a church close to home, the name of the church I was supposed to fill out was far away. One that none of the other kids in the school probably went to.

That was my first impression of religion; something you needed to tell people you did because they expected it of you. Not because you really did it. Religion is about filling in boxes.

Wednesday, November 16, 2005

When I type “God” into Google, I get this : “about 68,800,000 for god [definition]. (0.11 seconds)”.That means I got approximately sixty eight million, eight hundred thousand “hits” or references to god in Google’s database of the internet. If I click on the word “definition” I am transported to the site http://www.answers.com/god&r=67 where I am given the definition :

1.Goda.A being conceived as the perfect, omnipotent, omniscient originator and ruler of the universe, the principal object of faith and worship in monotheistic religions.

b.The force, effect, or a manifestation or aspect of this being.

2.A being of supernatural powers or attributes, believed in and worshiped by a people, especially a male deity thought to control some part of nature or reality.

3.An image of a supernatural being; an idol.

4.One that is worshiped, idealized, or followed: Money was their god.

5.A very handsome man.

6.A powerful ruler or despot.

[Middle English, from Old English.]

Who’d have thought to go to a dictionary? The search took 0.11 seconds.Perhaps not surprisingly, when I type “sex” I get this: “about 91,400,000 for sex [definition]. (0.07 seconds)” where I get this definition:

1.Sex

a.The property or quality by which organisms are classified as female or male on the basis of their reproductive organs and functions.

b.Either of the two divisions, designated female and male, of this classification.

2.Females or males considered as a group.

3.The condition or character of being female or male; the physiological, functional, and psychological differences that distinguish the female and the male. See Usage Note at gender.

4.The sexual urge or instinct as it manifests itself in behavior.

5.Sexual intercourse.

6.The genitals.

tr.v., sexed, sex·ing, sex·es.

1.To determine the sex of (an organism).

2.Slang.

a.To arouse sexually. Often used with up.

b.To increase the appeal or attractiveness of. Often used with up.

[Middle English, from Latin sexus.]

Although sex outdoes god by two million, two hundred sixty thousand, “love” returned one hundred seventy nine million, outdoing sex by eighty seven million, six hundred thousand. If, as my wife claims, God is love, then God beats sex hands down. (Money had two hundred one million hits. Maybe you can buy love.)

13If any man take a wife, and go in unto her, and hate her,14 And give occasions of speech against her, and bring up an evil name upon her, and say, I took this woman, and when I came to her, I found her not a maid: 15 Then shall the father of the damsel, and her mother, take and bring forth the tokens of the damsel's virginity unto the elders of the city in the gate: 16 And the damsel's father shall say unto the elders, I gave my daughter unto this man to wife, and he hateth her; 17 And, lo, he hath given occasions of speech against her, saying, I found not thy daughter a maid; and yet these are the tokens of my daughter's virginity. And they shall spread the cloth before the elders of the city. 18 And the elders of that city shall take that man and chastise him; 19 And they shall amerce him in an hundred shekels of silver, and give them unto the father of the damsel, because he hath brought up an evil name upon a virgin of Israel: and she shall be his wife; he may not put her away all his days. 20 But if this thing be true, and the tokens of virginity be not found for the damsel: 21 Then they shall bring out the damsel to the door of her father's house, and the men of her city shall stone her with stones that she die: because she hath wrought folly in Israel, to play the whore in her father's house: so shalt thou put evil away from among you. 22 If a man be found lying with a woman married to an husband, then they shall both of them die, both the man that lay with the woman, and the woman: so shalt thou put away evil from Israel. 23 If a damsel that is a virgin be betrothed unto an husband, and a man find her in the city, and lie with her; 24 Then ye shall bring them both out unto the gate of that city, and ye shall stone them with stones that they die; the damsel, because she cried not, being in the city; and the man, because he hath humbled his neighbour's wife: so thou shalt put away evil from among you.

I will post a list of everyones name that correctly guesses the book in the bible that these passages come from.

And to answer my burning question of whether burning fossil fuels is potentially harming the environment, I called the headquarters of ExxonMobile. The nice lady who answered the phone said it was just a bunch of hooey that some godless communists were spreading in an attempt to create dissention in this, the greatest nation on earth.

Wednesday, November 09, 2005

Fox News is a little bit on the ... Um ...It seems a little nasty to me. It's funny because these guys at Cornell are actually starting a debate. The debate seems like maybe something like, "Is stereotyping blacks as criminals helpful? SHould we avoid blacks in general the same way we should avoid police, because they are potentially dangerous?"

What apparently irked Smith is an article in the American decrying the lack of media attention to black-on-white crime in the area.

Blacks are as much more dangerous than whites as men are more dangerous than women

Blacks commit violent crimes at four to eight times the white rate. Hispanics commit violent crimes at approximately three times the white rate, and Asians at one half to three quarters the white rate

There is more black-on-white than black-on-black violent crime

Hispanics are a hate crime victim category but not a perpetrator category. Hispanic offenders are classified as white, which inflates the white offense rate and gives the impression that Hispanics commit no hate crimes.

If all of these numbers are correct, then why don’t we hear more about black-on-white crime from the media? The answer is because it would be deemed politically incorrect and racist to point out a minority’s shortcomings (i.e. a 70% illegitimacy rate, grossly disproportionate assault, murder, rape, and armed robbery rates, etc). Who’s to blame the media though? Such a gross detail of violence would most definitely spark NAACP backlash or Jesse Jackson tongue-lashings.

It is also common-knowledge that, regardless of one’s race, greater precaution is taken when traveling through black neighborhoods than white neighborhoods. In the words of prominent black economist Walter Williams, “I carry two friends with me when I go into New York [city]. And my friends are... Smith & Wesson.” So what is stopping people from realizing this and calling a spade a spade? The answer is nothing except the hesitation to “perpetuate stereotypes” and the possibility of being termed a racist because of it.

We, the professors and administrators, are also responsible for creating the sort of enduring infrastructure that will enhance the power of the anti-hate voice, for we do not have a level playing field when it comes to free speech and the exchange of ideas. The Supreme Court has affirmed the legitimacy of our interest in genuine diversity — that is to say, the presence of a critical mass of individuals from groups that have faced historical discrimination. We should take The American incident as a reminder that we must re-double our effort to build a diverse university community that establishes a critical mass of African-American and Latino/a faculty, senior administrators, and students.

I normally don't wager into fox news territory much. I found this one above the J-word one. (worth a read) But something in it struck me as worth reading. My experience in the Pacific Northwest has not left me with the feeling that blacks are especially dangerous, it's the cranksters we have to worry about here. Now there's a stereotype: People who fidgit like an earthquake, holes in their skin, hair falling out, teeth,- well, bad teeth, faint odor of formaldyhyde, and audibly grinding their bad teeth are more likely to steel, rob, urinate in public, die of infection and the like. So what's to stop us from calling that spade a spade. Or maybe in the case of the ones who have buck bad teeth, a rake. Or am I going over the same edge? It's all a little complicated. Anyway, it does seem in bad taste to phrase it the way they did but, hey, they're kids, right?